Vinod Kumar clinches bronze in discus throw, third medal for India in Paralympics

Tokyo: Discus thrower Vinod Kumar clinched a bronze medal in the men’s F52 event with an Asian record to give India its third medal in Tokyo Paralympics here on Sunday.

The 41-year-old BSF man, whose father fought in the 1971 Indo-Pak war, produced a best throw of 19.91m to finish third behind Piotr Kosewicz (20.02m) of Poland and Velimir Sandor (19.98m) of Croatia.

He injured his legs while training after joining the BSF, falling off a cliff in Leh that left him bed-ridden for close to a decade during which he lost both his parents.

The F52 classification is for athletes with impaired muscle power, restricted range of movement, limb deficiency or leg length difference, with athletes competing in a seated position.

It also applies to cervical cord injury, spinal cord injury, amputation, and functional disorder.

Both Bhavinaben Patel and Nishad Kumar had earlier won a silver each in women’s singles table tennis class 4 and men’s T47 high jump events respectively on Sunday.